#13. HARMALINE

SYNTHESIS : To a solution of 0.033 g 6-methoxytryptamine in 3.5
mL 0.1 N HCl, there was added 0.011 glycolaldehyde and the mixture was
heated on the steam bath for 1.5 h. The solution was then made basic
with 10 mL 0.5 N NaOH, and extracted with Et2O on a continuous
extractor. The Et2O extracts were pooled, dried over solid KOH, the
solvent removed under vacuum. The residue was an oil that crystallized
to give a solid, mp 170-175 °C, presumably a hydrate of
1-hydroxymethyl-7-methoxy-1,2,3,4-tetrahydro-b-carboline. This was
treated with 2.5 mL 90% H3PO4 and heated on the steam bath for 2
h. After dilution with H2O, this was made alkaline with aqueous NaOH
and extracted with Et2O. The pooled extracts were stripped of solvent
under vacuum, and the residue distilled to give a fraction (bp 120-140
at 0.001 mm/Hg) that weighed 0.027 g (72%). MS (in m/z): Parent ion
-1, parent ion, 213, 214 (100%, 89%); 198 (29%); 201 (23%); 170 (22%);
173 (19%). IR (in cm-1): 817, 832, 916, 1037, 1139, 1172. Harmaline
hydrochloride dihydrate; IR (in cm-1): 820, 841, 992, 1022, 1073,
1137.

There is a little bit of interesting history connected with the
melting point of harmaline. A report appeared that described an
alkaloid from Peganum harmala that looked like harmaline but which
melted 18 °C too high, and so it was thought to be an isomer and
was given the name harmadine. This was all cleared up a few years
later when it was observed that on an open melting point block,
harmaline had a mp 242-244 °C (with beginnings of sublimation at
189 °C) and harmadine had the values of 241-243 °C and 178
°C. In a capillary tube, harmaline melted at 256°C and harmadine
at 257 °C. So, harmadine is now a synonym for harmaline.

(with 150 mg, orally) "In an hour and a quarter, there was a
rapid-onset intoxication and I felt a little unstable. And a little
bit numb. There was an unusual shimmering, in my lateral vision when I
turned my head to the side. Everything was just a little bit
down. Music was pretty much normal but I was missing the higher
frequencies. Even light food sat heavily, and I wasn't too hungry (and
I was remembering to watch what I eat, with this monoamineoxidase
stuff). Sex was difficult -- probably due to some reduced
sensations. I feel that this compound is unlikely to be attractive to
most people, as its major effects are an intoxication with a clouding
of thoughts and some disruption of musical relationships."

(with 175 mg, orally) "After about one hour I found myself becoming
relaxed and a bit sloppy. By the end of the second hour, I had peaked,
and was pretty much at baseline after five hours. At the peak, three
areas of disturbance were obvious. There were obvious tracers -- when
looking at a bright object, and moving your eyes to the side, the
image of the object lags in its leaving the visual field, and it
leaves in the opposite direction. As to the auditory, it seemed as if
the higher frequencies of music were attenuated, and the lower
frequencies amplified. And as to touch, there is a definite numbing. I
had no appetite, and the little I ate didn't taste particularly
good."

(with 200 mg, orally) "At about the two hour point I remember three
things. The first was the effort to bring into reality the visual
image of a face that was playing with my eyes-closed imagery. I got
the mouth and, after a bit of work, I got the eyes. So I concentrated
on the nose and it came into view, finally, but it was upside
down. The second and third things were more easily defined. Nausea and
diarrhea. Fortunately they alternated. This is not my trip of
choice."

(with 300 mg, orally) "I was in a psychotherapy environment, so there
was some suggestions and leading that influenced my responses. But I
have great difficulty reliving my experience, in fact I don't remember
anything. I have only disconnected images. There is a girl -- me -- in
front of a church on a dusty road, myself at communion, receiving the
Host from an invisible hand at a grandiose alter. I feel that I am
going crazy. Something inside. It is not anxiety. It is not
depression. It is some of each, plus irritation and disorientation. I
am dead but still have to come back to life. I am facing a reality of
mine that I cannot accept."

(with 400 mg, orally) "This is Fluka material, and has a nasty
taste. I felt completely immobilized and sick to my stomach. Closed
eyed visuals yielded native women, 'organic' colors and shapes, and a
black panther! I would like to do DMT and Harmaline together, but am
put off by the nausea."

(with 500 mg, orally) "I took a half gram of pure synthetic harmaline
after fasting for over a day. The resulting nausea was greatly
attenuated after I vomited. At this dose there were intense and
annoying visual disturbances, and complete collapse of motor
co-ordination. I could barely stagger to the bathroom, and for
safety's sake locomoted by crawling. Tracers and weird visual
ripplings disturbed my sight with open eyes. With eyes closed, there
was eidetic imagery. It had no symbolic significance, just bothersome
disjointed sequences that lacked a relevant theme. They proceeded to
transform so slowly (in comparison to the speed of my thought) that
they were predictable and boring. Throughout the experience I just lay
hoping it would end soon. It did not seem as though I had encountered
intrapsychic material which was being expressed through somatic
symptoms. Rather, I felt that I was struggling to metabolize a
chemical disruption of my physiological functions. Although the
session was not enjoyable, I was satisfied at having educated myself
about the effect produced by a penalty dose of this compound."

(with 2 g Peganum harmala seeds, ground, in capsules) "No effects."

(with 5 g Peganum harmala seeds, ground, in capsules) "At about 1:45
tinnitus was obvious. At 2:00 precise movements were problematical and
nystagmus was noticeable. Mild nausea and diarrhea, but no vomiting. I
was sensitive to light and sound, and retired to a dark
room. Hallucinations were intense, but only with the eyes closed. They
consisted, initially, of a wide variety of geometrical patterns in
dark colors, getting more intense as time went on. They disappeared
when the eyes were opened. Although the loose bowels and nausea were
pretty constant through the first part of the trip, I was not
afraid. It was as if the "fear circuits" in the brain had been turned
off. The geometric shapes evolved into more concrete images, peoples
faces, movies of all sorts playing at high speed, and animal presences
such as snakes. It was like vivid and intense dreaming except that I
remembered most of it afterwards. In another hour things became
manageable and I could go out in public. My sex drive was pleasantly
enhanced, and I slept very well."

(with 20 g Peganum harmala seeds, as extract) "The is equivalent,
probably, to a gram or so of the harmala alkaloids. This was ground up
material extracted with hot dilute lemon juice. Within a half hour, I
found myself both trippy and sleepy. Then I became quite
disorientated, nauseous, and with an accelerated heart beat. I had the
strong sensation of moving backwards, drifting, with faint visuals
under my eyelids. Restraining the vomiting urge was an ongoing
problem. I could have gone out of body quite easily, except that I was
completely anchored by the nausea. After about three hours, I knew
that it had peaked, and I went to sleep and experienced intense and
strange dreams. The entire experience was a conflict between tripping
and being sick. I want to explore this more."

(with 28 g Peganum harmala seeds, as extract) "I sat up late one night
drinking gulp after gulp of tea from about an oz. of seeds,
periodically adding more water and simmering. This process took
several hours, and though I had read up on harmaline, I didn't know
quite what to expect. Suddenly it hit me like a wall. It was starting
to get light outside and as I shifted my gaze, zebra-like stripes of
light and dark spiraled off the perimeter of the window
silhouettes. Every time I shifted my focus my visual field would
shudder and swirl before settling down. This visual effect had a
physicality unlike those any other entheogen I'd experienced. Rather
than patterns revealing greater order in sensation, these were waves
of chaos revealing no particular order and urging the mind to retreat
from the disturbing realm of sensation. Accompanying this was a
pronounced auditory buzz. Lying down and closing my eyes I left the
physical symptoms behind and explored the vivid spontaneous
imaginations evoked by this state. Unfortunately, it is getting light,
which made it harder to shut out the distracting world of sensation. I
resolved to conduct future sessions in the night-time (and always in a
quiet undisturbed place).

"A second trial was made at the same level. This time it came on very
fast. That tremendous buzz on the other side of which are the wondrous
realms of the subconscious. The most memorable impressions from this
trip were of weird animals. I imagined myself spinning on a
merry-go-round of strange winged creatures. I started to feel very
sick and negotiated my way to the bathroom to face the inevitable --
voiding from both orifices simultaneously. It proved cathartic, and
released me to experience the state more fully. I remember traveling
to jungle-like places, full of imagery of vines, fountains, and
animals. Minutes seemed like hours as I roamed in these
spaces. Though the sensory effects were very disturbing when I got up,
given high dose level, I could easily ignore my body when laying down
and traveling in my mind."

EXTENSIONS AND COMMENTARY : Right off the bat, I must make an
apology, in that I have commingled reports employing harmaline as a
single chemical, with reports employing seeds from Peganum
harmala. This is of course pharmacological nonsense in that harmaline
is a pure chemical substance, whereas the seeds of the P. harmala
contain harmine as well, along with a lot of other alkaloids that
could well play some role in its psychopharmacology profile.

There is a valid reason for this commingling of the reports of the
effects of this chemical and plant, however. In many peoples' minds,
the two materials are felt to be exclusively monoamineoxidase
inhibitors, and to be interchangeable. I recently read the following
bit of advice somewhere on the internet. "If you really want to get
off on 'shrooms, take some harmaline or Syrian Rue seeds along with
them." This one phrase embodies a number of popular myths in the
psychedelic drug subculture. Let me try to unravel this tangled
knot.

Some drugs are metabolized by the removal of the needed amine
function. This deamination results from the action of an enzyme system
that is called a monoamineoxidase, or a MAO. If this enzyme system is
inhibited, then the drug would be destroyed to a lesser extent, and
would have a greater potency. The material that protects the drug
from this erosion is called a monoamineoxidase inhibitor, or a
MAOI. As a result, some drugs that do not show any oral activity (such
as DMT) become available when the oxidizing enzymes are made
dysfunctional by an inhibitor. This is the heart of the chapter Huasca
vs. Ayahuasca, where this argument is treated at length. But, there is
a general inference that the MAOI is, itself, without action and this
is simply not correct. They might show some activity in that there are
a lot of dietary amines, some of them pretty toxic things, that
normally do not bother us since our body defenses can destroy
them. Take away that defense, and they can express their toxicity. But
I truly believe that there can be a complex spectrum of
pharmacological properties that are intrinsic to the inhibiting
drug. A goodly number of our prescription anti-depressants on the
market today have exactly this mechanism of action.

That is the reason for the presentation of the effects of harmaline by
itself, and of Peganum harmala seeds, just by themselves. They are
very different from one-another, although both can be pretty rough on
the body.

Now, I would like to reenter the qualitative comments mode, this time
with the use of harmaline or Peganum harmala in conjunction with a
second drug. In some of these examples, the inhibitor was taken ahead
of the actual tryptamine, as indicated by the time statement.

FURTHER QUALITATIVE COMMENTS :

WITH DMT

(with 20 mg harmaline and 55 mg DMT) "There was nothing for three
hours, and then I became aware of some eyes-closed hypnogogic
abstractions. The peak was slightly longer with adrenergic push
somewhat more intense than what the mild psychic effects would
suggest. The come-down was equally drawn out. It all was certainly
less intense than when the DMT is smoked."

(with 80 mg harmaline, 40 mg DMT [60 min]) "There was quite a bit of
visual activity. The onset was subtle, but the drop-off was quick."

(with 100 mg harmaline, 120 mg DMT [10 min]) "It was not until 80
minutes into the experiment that it became clear that CNS effects were
occurring. Initially this was felt as clarity of detail of everything
around me followed by slight time distortion. There was no loss of
reality but closed eye imagery developed rapidly, later becoming
present even with eyes open even though less intense. Images were
initially very colorful consisting of sheets of patterns infinitely
repeated with some gentle waviness, somewhat like looking through a
kaleidoscope. Deliberate shifting of attention was possible at all
times and although gait was mildly affected it was possible to perform
any given task with concentration. There was no loss of identity or
reality. Pupillary movements did not change the area of focus of my
'sight', which was surprising. Images could be willfully dismissed as
desired with eyes open. Music became another world with headphones on,
and 'Hearts of Space' albums easily became voyages which could be
interrupted at any desired point with eyes opening. The effects began
to recede at the two and a half hour point. The bright colors and
patterns had shifted to less intense scenery in a calm peaceful
way. At no time was there any noticeable amphetamine jaw-clenching,
hyperactivity, or restlessness. The entire episode had ended at the
four hour point leaving an intense feeling of happiness and
amazement. Sleep was easy at five hours, and yet for the subsequent 30
hours my concentration was noticeably impaired. There were no motor
problems or incoordination, yet short-term memory was significantly
disrupted, requiring deliberate concentration on minor things. At 38
hours my mental condition seemed back to normal. The only criticism I
might make of this experience was that there seemed to be none of the
insight that I had experienced with TMA-2. This seems, however, to be
a very psychologically safe experience for almost anyone and was very
enjoyable."

(with 150 mg harmaline, 35 mg DMT [20 minutes]) "Initial effects were
noted at 70 minutes, characterized by feelings of mild intoxication
followed by significant visual distortions and inability to focus
thoughts. By two hours, colored patterning was present with
eyes-closed but the images flashed through consciousness so quickly
that they could not be considered or analyzed. There as a pronounced
sensation of being cold that was difficult to change, despite a very
warm heating blanket. An interesting finding was that I was unable to
visually "picture" some desired scene. In other words, I could
verbally say that I wanted to visualize a forest, or a horse, or a
tree, but none of these items could be brought forward. The rapid
flood of thoughts quickly became exhausting and there was a strong
desire to avoid all stimuli, including music, TV, or any other
sounds. The effects began declining at the three-hour point and were
essentially gone at five hours. I am beginning to reach the conclusion
that DMT has few redeeming qualities. So far, it cannot compare with
the insight and clarity of thought which occur with some of the
phenethylamines and phenylisopropylamines. This potent activity at the
35 milligram level suggests that the 150 milligrams harmaline dose is
highly effective as an MAO blocker."

(with 150 mg harmaline, 80 mg DMT [20 min]) "At just about an hour
into it there was a rapid onset intoxication with some staggers and
difficult walking. During the next half hour, there were closed-eye
visuals along with nausea and a severe depression. I turned on all the
lights in the room for security, although I do not like bright
lights. I considered calling a friend on the phone, but then I
realized that nothing could reassure me at this point. Intellectually
I knew that I was safe, but psychologically there was overwhelming
loss of self worth and a feeling of despair. This was a sever
ego-smashing experience which might have been diagnosed as psychosis
if a psychiatrist had been present. The effects lasted longer than
anticipated, with a gradual return to normality at the fifth hour, and
an hour later I slept. Despite the negative experience, the next day I
realized that I had viewed many aspects of my life with extraordinary
clarity and insight, and as a result of this experience I intend to
try to change several of these personal flaws."

(with the extract of 3 g Peganum harmala seeds, 40 mg DMT) "The DMT
was noticeably effective just over an hour following ingestion, and it
built up to a peak rather quickly. It stayed there for an hour, then
dropped off. I would call the overall effect mild."

(with the extract of 5 g Peganum harmala seeds, 20 mg DMT [0 min])
"There was a feeling of aliveness and excitement, above and beyond the
effects of this amount of harmel seeds alone."

WITH 5-MeO-DMT

(with 70 mg harmaline, 10 mg 5-MeO-DMT [0 min]). "I felt changes in
pressure around the eyes at 18 minutes, and there was a floating
feeling when walking. I had peaked at an hour and a half, probably at
a plus three, with no visuals, no emotionals, no intellectuals, no
negative, no positive. A little nausea. I am not sure why I am at a
+++ but I am. By the 2 hour point I am coming down. At three hours, I
noticed a complete change of character, the harmaline was beginning to
kick in. This grew in intensity for several hours, with quite a bit of
nausea. This was fully equivalent to 300 mg. harmaline alone, but
without the physiological noise. At 12 hours I got a little sleep with
a lot of dreams."

(with 80 mg harmaline, 10 mg 5-MeO-DMT) "This was conceptually very
active. Extremely rewarding. Remarkable difference from the harmaline
alone, or the tryptamine alone, neither of which would have been
active taken this way, orally."

(with 150 mg harmaline, 25 mg 5-MeO-DMT [60 min]) "In about 15 minutes
I began to feel the typical effects of 5-MeO-DMT, a gradually building
emotion of solid, somewhat boiling, turbulent feeling. I began to feel
like vomiting so I did so, several times. Waves of the inner feeling
would approach completely removing my awareness of the physical world,
but it never reached that point as it does when I have smoked 12
milligrams of 5-MeO-DMT alone. The experience was quite intense but I
never felt a great deal of fear. I consciously debated whether or not
to smoke some 5-MeO-DMT in order to break through this 'middle' level
of experience into a complete transcendent state as I had experienced
in the past. But the complexities of asking for the pipe and managing
to smoke it seemed too much, even with assistance. I abandoned the
idea.

"I started to come 'down' into a more differentiated consciousness,
and the first thing I felt was a powerful, aggressive sexual
feeling. I was not wearing any clothes and I spent a long time, over
an hour, writhing around, occasionally uttering phrases of one or
three or four words of a very hostile and/or sexual nature. I remember
saying I hated my sitter (a female) and God, but it was quite clear
that it was the sexual/maternal image of the sitter that I hated as
something that I desired and felt dependent upon while resenting that
I needed something I did not have within myself. The next phase found
me physically calm and quiet. Finally, after four hours, I felt sleepy
and comfortable. I ate well, and was in a good mood.

" I do not feel that taking a higher dose orally would necessarily
have pushed me through to the state achieved by smoking because the
onset was so, so slow. I don't think I'll repeat this
combination."

WITH TMPEA

(with 150 mg harmaline, 200 mg TMPEA (2,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine)
[20 min]) "A very faint peripheral visual flicker was noted at 40
minutes. By 80 minutes, a decrease in coordination was apparent and
walking required somewhat more attention than normal. This
incoordination increased gradually, peaking at three hours. By this
time the visual latency characteristic of harmaline was pronounced
(when rotating the head or gazing quickly in a different direction,
the prior images exit the visual field in a multiple wave fashion in a
direction opposite to the motion). At no time were there any
detectable effects on thought, and there was no open or closed-eye
imagery, with or without music. No effects were detectable at the five
hour point and sleep was easily achieved shortly thereafter. In
summary, there was nothing there that could not be explained by the
harmaline alone.

WITH MESCALINE

(with 100 mg harmaline, 60 mg mescaline
(3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine) [20 min]) "At two hours I was in a
pleasant state of physical relaxation, a fine sense of well being, and
I found music most enjoyable. From then to the fourth hour, thoughts
flowed freely, and it became obvious that insight was a major part of
this experience. Normally unconscious thoughts were easily
available. It was as if I could observe my mind in operation, as facts
were weighed to form conclusions. By the sixth hour music was a thing
of beauty, with the higher notes crisp and clear. The harmaline has
probably worn off. Sleep at eight hours, and the next day was without
any adverse effects. This was a remarkable experience, the insight of
TMA, and the relaxation of MDMA."

(with 150 mg harmaline, 100 mg mescaline [15 min]) "A stomach ache
developed at about 45 minutes, followed by a mild nausea which
occurred intermittently throughout the next six hours. I felt
comfortable, although there was a slight discoordination at about two
hours. Walking was never a problem but did require more concentration
than normal. Colors on the television were obviously more intense, and
highly saturated at this point and moderate photophobia
developed. Even a fire in the fireplace was distracting, and stereo
was best enjoyed in the dark. Attempts at sleep did not work until the
ninth hour. Upon awakening there was a feeling of dehydration but
otherwise no ill effects. Mild looseness of stools was present later
that morning. Since experiments using only mescaline at doses between
80 and 120 mg resulted in no CNS effects at all, it seems clear that
the MAO blocking effects of the harmaline were crucial to this
experience.

FURTHER EXTENSIONS AND COMMENTARY : There is a fascinating
unanswered question that I had to ask myself a little while ago. It is
a question that, if ever answered accurately, just might throw the
entire area of the pharmacology of harmaline into a delightful
disarray. I received a small quantity of documented seeds of Syrian
rue and I was curious to see, in my hands, what its alkaloid content
was. This is, after all, a well known source rapidly increasing in
popularity as the inhibitor component of ayahuasca. So I ground a few
of them up in a mortar under DMF and carbonate, spun down the extract,
dissolved a drop of it in a milliliter of 90:10 toluene/butanol, and
shot a microliter into the GCMS. As expected, there were two major
peaks, and an intriguing scatter of small things. The spectrum of
first was clearly that of harmaline, and of the second, that of
harmine. The literature is correct.

Then, to tidy up a bit and make absolutely sure of the relative
retention times, I decided to run standards from my reference
collection. Reference harmine gave the second peak with identical
retention time and MS spectrum. It was when I injected a sample of my
reference harmaline that I got my surprise. Here, a sample of
E. Merck AG, Darmstadt yellow crystalline material labeled
Harmalinhydrochlorid, was very much looking as if it was a mixture of
about two parts harmaline and one part harmine. Only 70% pure? Wow.

Three explanations popped into mind. (1) Maybe the harmine was being
generated from harmaline, somehow, in my analysis. So I tried another
reference sample, one recently purchased, and it gave a single
peak. So it was not an artifact arising from some quirk of my
analytical process. (2) Maybe the Merck sample, which I had obtained
in the early 1960's (and of course I had no way of knowing how old it
was when I got it) had come from plant sources, maybe even
P. harmala itself. Maybe the analytical tools at the time were
inadequate to detect and identify this amount of harmine as an
impurity. This is not comfortable, in that these two alkaloids were
first isolated, and separated from one-another, from plant sources
some 150 years ago. I am sure my sample is not that old. I am not sure
that even E. Merck AG is that old. The tools of analysis have been
around a long time. Anyway, I wrote to them, and they answered me with
the elliptical comment stating that they had never had harmaline in
their catalog, only harmine. And thus, they would have no way of
knowing what was in the bottle. Of course they could have distributed
research samples of many things, of stuff that was never in their
catalog, but by replying in this way they are absolved of all
guilt. And of all legal responsibility as well, of course. OK.

This leaves (3). Maybe over the years, harmaline spontaneously loses a
molecule of hydrogen, and becomes harmine. Not an easy thing to reckon
with, chemically, but I am running out of possibilities. I was led to
a comment that had been once made by a quiet hero of mine, Bo
Holmstedt in Sweden, concerning the analysis of an ancient sample of
plant material from Banisteria caapi (now known as
Banisteriopsis caapi). The herbarium specimens he was looking
at had been collected by the 19th century plant explorer Richard
Spruce in the Rio Negro area of South America and had, after a few
years of storage in a moist and mildewy hut a few miles down river,
been rediscovered and sent on to the Kew Botanical Museum where they
had quietly rested for over a hundred years. When Holmstedt worked
them up some 30 years ago, he reported that the alkaloid content was
0.4%. This was virtually identical to a newly collected, botanically
verified specimen of Banisteriopsis caapi which he analyzed at
the same time and found to contain 0.5% alkaloids. The latter material
contained, as described by many authors, the main alkaloids harmine,
harmaline and tetrahydroharmine. By contrast, the alkaloid content of
the Spruce material consisted exclusively of harmine. It is open to
question whether the samples collected by Spruce in 1853 originally
contained only harmine or, perhaps more likely, that harmaline and
tetrahydroharmine have with time been transformed into the chemically
more stable aromatic b-carboline harmine.

How can this enigma be answered? Put away a sample of pure harmaline,
with its spectral identification, onto the shelf for 50 or 100 years,
and then re-analyze it? Who knows, but what might be needed for this
conversion is heat, or a bit of iron catalyst, or some unknown species
of South American mold. Acid is certainly known to promote this
oxidation. It would be very much worth while to answer this question
because some, perhaps much, of the results of human pharmacological
studies that involve harmaline as a metabolic poison, may be
influenced by the independent action of harmine as a harmaline
contaminant.

If indeed the use of Peganum harmala becomes increasingly popular as a
harmaline source, some help might be useful for those who do not have
balances and need to call upon volumes instead. I decided to make an
equivalency table between weights, and volumes, and quantities, and
laboratory numbers, and kitchen things, so that some consistency might
be found in the measurement of the botanical materials that are being
used. In short, how heavy is something or how bulky is it? My starting
point was the most frequently used tool that is mentioned,
continuously, in the lay press dealing with drugs and drug use. It is
the teaspoon. How much stuff is there in a teaspoon? Just how big is a
teaspoon? What is a teaspoon? Is it a small semi-spherical metal scoop
hanging from a ring that has other scoops of different dimensions
attached, that is found in the knife and cork-puller drawer in the
kitchen? Or is it a schluppy thing, with an artistic handle on it,
that adds sugar to your coffee and does the stirring? Do you heap
stuff up on it, or do you level it off by smoothing it flat with your
finger? The dictionary says that a teaspoonful contains exactly 1.333
fluid drams. Oh wow! Let's look it up. You will discover that this is
a total cop-out if you read the dictionary definitions of dram: (1)
1.771 grams if you are using the avoirdupois system, or (2) 3.887
grams if you are using the apothecaries system. So, how does a
non-pharmacist person, without an analytical scale or an immediate
command of the avoirdupois versus apothecaries vocabulary, measure a
wanted quantity of Peganum seeds?

I would suggest using the following scale, remembering that with water
weights can be easily interchanged with volumes, since water has a
weight that is equal to its volume. In both of these scales, the water
and the rue, the teaspoon is the small semi-spherical thing in the
cork-puller drawer, leveled off:

---- This is for water ----

1 teaspoon water = 0.16 ounces (5 grams)

3 teaspoons = 1 tablespoon = 0.5 ounce (14 grams)

2 tablespoons = 1 ounce (28 grams)

4 tablespoons = 1/4 cup = 2 ounces

16 tablespoons = 1 cup = 1/2 pint = 8 ounces

2 cups = 1 pint = 1 pound

2 pints = 1 quart

4 quarts = 1 gallon

or, as I had learned as a childhood rhyme; a pint's a pound, the world
around.

You must remember, this volume thing has its own traps. When you start
using the volume measurement for things such as seeds, or bark, or
leaves, or other biological things that are not of the density of
water, they possess varying degrees of fluffiness, and the weights
will be less than the volumes. The Rosetta stone translation that is
appropriate here is based on the fact that the Peganum harmala seeds
are just over half the density of water. And, since they may contain
from 2 to 6% its weight of alkaloids, the following equations are
useful: